Jesse Myers (piano) and Leanna Keith (flute) collaborate in this concert to present two of Nicole Lizée’s etudes for glitch film. In her Hitchcock Etudes, the composer glitches and stitches scenes from “Psycho”, “The Birds”, “Rope”, and “The Man Who Knew Too Much”, all while superimposing live piano music on the soundtrack. In a similar manner, Lizée pulls from Tarantino’s “Reservoir Dogs”, “Pulp Fiction”, and “Kill Bill”, while a virtuosic bass flute solo is used to seam them all together. Check out what we believe will be an unforgettable audio-visual, avant-garde, cult film experience.

Called a “brilliant musical scientist” and lauded for “creating a stir with listeners for her breathless imagination and ability to capture Gen-X and beyond generation”, JUNO-nominated composer Nicole Lizée creates new music from an eclectic mix of influences including the earliest MTV videos, turntablism, rave culture, Hitchcock, Kubrick, 1960s psychedelia and 1960s modernism. She is fascinated by the glitches made by outmoded and well-worn technology and captures these glitches, notates them and integrates them into live performance. Nicole’s compositions range from works for orchestra and solo turntablist featuring DJ techniques fully notated and integrated into a concert music setting, to other unorthodox instrument combinations that include the Atari 2600 video game console, omnichords, stylophones, Simon™, and karaoke tapes. In the broad scope of her evolving oeuvre she explores such themes as malfunction, reviving the obsolete, and the harnessing of imperfection and glitch to create a new kind of precision.

Seattle-based pianist Jesse Myers is an adventurous explorer of music that expands the possibilities of the piano. With a strong interest in performance that pushes piano music into new realms, Myers frequently performs music for prepared piano, new music for piano and electronics, as well as traditional classical literature. He is a performer, educator, and composer with a goal of giving the audience a fresh perspective of the piano and an imaginative understanding of the music. His solo concerts have been featured in City Arts Magazine, KingFM’s Second Inversion, Seattle Weekly, The Live Music Project, and were a part of The Stranger’s Best Concerts of 2017 for three seasons. His recent work with the prepared piano and electroacoustic music has led to tours across the country including artist residencies and guest performances at Cornish College of the Arts, Capital University Conservatory of Music, Bowling Green State University, Lewis University. Myers has a Master of Music degree from the University of Washington in piano performance. He also attended Bowling Green State University, where he earned his Bachelor of Music in piano performance. His important teachers have been Robin McCabe, Virginia Marks, Valrie Kantorsk, Frances Burnett, and Marylin Shrude.

A freelance flutist, improviser, and composer in the Seattle area, Leanna Keith delights in creating sound experiences that make audiences laugh, cry, and say: “I didn’t know the flute could do that!” She actively performs around the country in concert halls, bars, cafes, and classrooms, bringing along a menagerie of flutes that include her bass flute, alto flute, dizi, and shinobue, as well as a variety of electronics. She also is dedicated to playing music by composers who are still living, and advocates for the usage of music as social activism. She currently performs with the vocal/flute duo Stack Effect with vocalist Kaley Lane Eaton, Keith/Larson Duo with guitarist Zachary Larson, Crows at a Crosswalk with bouzouki player Daniel Husser, experimental chamber troupe Kin of the Moon, and the Japanese drumming ensemble Dekoboko Taiko. Ms. Keith is often sought as an clinician and private lesson instructor. She has taught masterclasses and workshops on a variety of subjects including: flute technique and tone development, extended techniques, composer collaboration, electronics and music creation, improvisation, and world flutes. She currently serves as the flute instructor for Cornish College of the Arts, as well as a teaching artist for the Seattle Symphony. She has a BM from the University of Nebraska at Omaha, and received a MM from the University of Washington.

Marcus Fischer is a first generation American musician + interdisciplinary artist based in Portland. His work typically centers around memory, geography + the manipulation of physical audio recording mediums. Slowly unfolding melodies and warm tape saturated drones have become a trademark of his recordings + live performances alike. These sounds have found their way into multimedia installations, short flims, and even into the award-winning public radio program Radiolab. Fischer has released a number of recordings on the widely respected 12k label including his photographic + sonic collaborations with label founder Taylor Deupree. In 2017 he was an artist in residence at the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation/Rauschenberg Residency where he completed Loss, his most recent album (2017). Fischer performs solo, in collaborations, and as a member of unrecognizable now, secret drum band and wild card.

Since a young age, Thomas Meluch has been fascinated by natural sounds and the textures of decay. He began playing piano before his feet could reach the pedals, and for more than a decade has sought to create a unique sonic environment by combining remnants of pop song structures with the lushness and unpredictability of field recordings. A veteran drummer of a half dozen bands and an avid collector of instruments and analog devices, Meluch relies on guitar and voice as the bases for his work as Benoît Pioulard.

Hotel Neon is the Philadelphia-based trio of Michael Tasselmyer, Andrew Tasselmyer, and Steven Kemner. Together they create immersive and atmospheric soundscapes aided by projected film and images. Known for its heavy emphasis on enveloping walls of sound, Hotel Neon also utilizes subtle melodies and improvisation to create a richly layered musical experience, rewarding any level of listener scrutiny. Since forming in early 2013, the group has released four full-length albums through the Home Normal, Fluid Audio, and ARCHIVES labels. Hotel Neon has toured extensively throughout the U.S.A. and collaborated with a global roster of talent, bringing its unique brand of dense, layered drone to a wide range of performance spaces including basements, radio studios, and cavernous cathedrals.

Christopher Icasiano is a Filipino-American percussionist and composer from Redmond, WA. His influences include 90’s R&B, hip-hop, contemporary classical, folk, metal and noise, and his music finds intersections between the experimental and the mainstream. He tours internationally with his drum-sax duo Bad Luck, several folk and pop bands, and as a solo artist. As a curator, Icasiano creates mind-expanding experiences featuring unconventional music in club environments. He co-founded and co-organizes the Racer Sessions, a weekly Seattle free-improvisation jam session and performance series, and the grassroots arts organization Table & Chairs. His chicken adobo is delicious, he has run three marathons, and his current karaoke song is Luther Vandross’ “So Amazing.”

Classically trained and rigorously de-trained, possessor of a restless, semi-feral spirit, Lori Goldston is a cellist, composer, improvisor, producer, writer and teacher from Seattle. Her voice as a cellist, amplified or acoustic, is full, textured, committed and original. A relentless inquirer, she wanders recklessly across borders that separate genre, discipline, time and geography, performing in clubs, cafes, galleries, arenas, concert halls, sheds, ceremonies, barbecues, and stadiums.

Amy Denio, the beloved saxophonist, vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and co-founder of the singular Tiptons now brings innovative music to the rest of the world. Known as Seattle’s Avant Goddess, Denio will share her compositions and improvisations exploring her 4-octave voice colored by electronics. A born improviser, Denio has written and produced over 400 compositions, large and small. Conjuring up a rich blend of sounds, she occasionally invites the audience to join in. Denio was inducted into the Seattle Jazz Hall of Fame in 2015.

Through her deep commitment to new music of all periods, pianist Ana Cervantes puts different times, sensibilities and musical voices into dialogue. Impassioned creator of connections, she opens doors for her listeners. She has inspired, commissioned and been the guiding force for major collections of new piano music from the most eminent living composers of the Americas and Europe.

For Canto de la Monarca: Mujeres en México / Song of the Monarch: Women in México (2008-2013) Ana Cervantes asked 16 composers of six countries for a piece for solo piano inspired by women who had transcendental roles in Mexican history. The project’s symbol is the Monarch butterfly: a potent metaphor for persistence and valor in a seemingly fragile body.

The first half will consist of three fifteen-minute quartet sets; the second half will be a longer piece where anything can happen (as long as there are only four people on stage at one time). When someone plays a second time, they must play a different instrument!

CILLA VEE LIFE ARTS is an inter-disciplinary arts organization founded in 2002 in the South Bronx by Claire Elizabeth Barratt (aka Cilla Vee), now based in Asheville, North Carolina. It serves as an umbrella for multiple projects that focus on collaboration and facilitation. With a mission of blurring boundaries and crossing categories, CVLA draws from a diverse pool of artists with a wide range of artistic backgrounds. Performances can include anything from dance, movement, music, sound, text, film and video, visual and performance art to installation and beyond. This Fall Cilla Vee is touring cross-country and the west coast in order to connect and collaborate with area artists in each location.

Duos, Trios, Quartets and All.
Picked randomly on the spot.
Unpredictable.
Each artist could do anything at any moment.
Do we have the Psychic Bandwidth to absorb it all?
To see everything. To hear everything.
To catch and process each interaction.
Casting our psychic net wide and reeling it all in to our consciousness.

About

Each month, Nonsequitur and a community of like-minded organizations and artists present ten concerts of adventurous and experimental music in the gorgeous Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center: contemporary/post-classical composition, free improvisation and the outer limits of jazz, electronic/electroacoustic music, new instruments, phonography, sound art, and other innovative musics. Watch a video clip about us on the Seattle Channel.